Dr Paul Dwyer

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Biographical details

After almost a decade of professional theatre work, mostly as an actor, animateur, director or dramaturg in the field of youth/community theatre, Paul returned to University study in the mid-1990s, gaining a Diplôme d'Etudes Approfondies in Theatre Studies from the University of Paris (8) and a PhD in Performance Studies from the University of Sydney.

His doctoral thesis focused on various modifications of, and continuing challenges to, the theory and practice of Augusto Boal's 'Theatre of the Oppressed'. More recently, his research has examined genres of social performance that relate to reconciliation processes of one kind or another – from analyses of protest actions such as the Aboriginal Tent Embassy through to studies of ‘restorative justice conferences’ in the NSW juvenile justice system and village-based ritual reconciliation ceremonies in Bougainvlle (PNG).

In addition to conventional forms of scholarly research, Paul has a strong track record of developing creative practice-as-research through his involvement with professional theatre companies such as Version 1.0 and Belvoir St Theatre. He has co-devised a number of critically acclaimed documentary theatre pieces, including The Bougainville Photoplay Project which toured nationally in 2010 and was awarded a Melbourne Green Room Award for Best Mise en Scène in Alternative/Hybrid Theatre.

Research interests

Teaching and supervision

Current Teaching

Paul currently teaches units on performance analysis, performance and its relation to social/political struggle, contemporary "postmodern" performance and ethnographic approaches to the study of rehearsal.

Supervision

Aspects of theatre architecture

Theatre design

Site-specific performance

New media art

Community cultural development

In addition to supervising prospective students in any of the areas listed above, he is interested in a number of 'applied theatre' topics (drama/theatre in education, theatre and therapy, performative aspects of various legal processes etc.) and in work that might cross the disciplines of linguistics and performance studies (eg. 'multi-modal' discourse analysis; translation studies etc.).

Current projects

Restorative justice and/as performance. An ethnographic project looking at performative behaviours in various models of restorative justice. The research involves field observations of ‘youth justice conferences’ in the NSW Juvenile Justice system and of ritual reconciliation ceremonies in the villages of Bougainville (PNG).

Associations

Dramaturgy credits with version 1.0 theatre company include CMI (A Certain Maritime Incident), The Wages of Spin, From a Distance, Deeply Offensive and Utterly Untrue and This Kind of Ruckus. He also co-wrote and performed in The Bougainville Photoplay Project and Beautiful One Day (a co-production between Belvoir St Theatre, Version 1.0, Ilbijerri Aboriginal Theatre Company and residents of Palm Island).